In today's world we reduce all events to the Principle of Cause and Effect (causality) and ask, which cause belongs to which effect. Carl G. Jung, toward the end of his life, realized that there is another type of events. Such events are directed toward a goal, that is, they lead into an event which has no cause. Therefore, they correspond to a new creation. In religious language such "effects" without "cause" were considered as miracles. The Catholic Church calls the underlying principle the providence of God.

When one observes one's dreams over a longer period of time, one becomes aware that often outward events occur that are very similar to the content of one's dreams. It would seem that the inner world and the outer world coincide. Carl G. Jung had suggested that one should - instead of looking...

Pioneered by William James, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Gustav Jung, Depth Psychology is the study of how we dialogue with the Unconscious via symbols, dreams, myth, art, nature. By paying attention to the messages that show up from beyond our conscious egos, we can be guided to greater understanding, transformation, and integration with the world around us, inner and outer. Join the conversation in community at www.DepthPsychologyAlliance.com

The biblical story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (Genesis Chapters 2-3) is foundational to our Western culture and has influenced the upbringing and psychology of all of us, whether we realize it or not. Mythologists as well as many biblical scholars recognize the story as being in the genre of myth, which makes it appropriate to analyze it from the perspective of depth psychology, among other approaches.

Indeed, as Joseph Campbell concluded, “This story yields its meaning only to a psychological interpretation” (2001, p. 50). Further, Carl Jung (CW 9.2, para. 230) had already written that “cosmogonic myths are, at bottom, symbols for the coming of consciousness.” But the literature about the Eden story taking such a psychological approach is scant, largely due to traditional and problematic gaps and tensions between academic disciplines....

Echopsychology - Part I

The feelings of isolation and dysfunction that are so pervasive today have at their root a denial of our essential connections to nature and the non-human world. To heal, we must now find our way back home. "Ecopsychology represents an attempt to find ecology within the context of human psychology, " says Theodore Roszak, "and in turn , to find human psychology within the context of ecology. This is a natural synthesis that we are trying to bring about in the hope that it will strengthen, broaden, and deepen both of these fields. I simply take this to be the richest, most dramatic and exciting intellectual enterprise I've come across in years." ... (Click title for more)

Our Unique Image - James Hillman

"Each life is formed by its unique image, an image that is the essence of that life and calls it to a destiny. As the force of fate, this image acts as a personal daimon, an accompanying guide who remembers your calling." (James Hillman)

Jungian Analysis is about much more than just dream interpretation. Yet dreams can be a useful way to gain understanding about what is going on in our lives. Dreams offer insight into ourselves that we may otherwise be unaware of, or not have in a clear or correct perspective.

Dreams typically are expressed in the mytho-poetic language of the psyche. We can say that dreams are symbolic expressions of the deep meaning, needs, and desires of the Self.

These 10 steps provide a framework that will allow you to better understand your dreams and thereby, better interpret the meaning of your dreams... (Click here for full article)

Instinct. An involuntary drive toward certain activities. All psychic processes whose energies are not under conscious control are instinctive.

Jung identified five prominent groups of instinctive factors: creativity, reflection, activity, sexuality and hunger. Hunger is a primary instinct of self-preservation, perhaps the most fundamental of all drives. Sexuality is a close second, particularly prone to psychization, which makes it possible to divert its purely biological energy into other channels. The urge to activity manifests in travel, love of change, restlessness and play. Under reflection, Jung included the religious urge and the search for meaning. Creativity was for Jung in a class by itself. His descriptions of it refer specifically to the impulse to create art.

Though we cannot classify it with a high degree of accuracy, the creative instinct is something that deserves special mention. I do not know if “instinct” is the correct word. We use the term “creative instinct” because this factor behaves at least dynamically, like an instinct. Like instinct it is compulsive, but it is not common, and it is not a fixed and invariably....(Click title for more)

Our instincts and how they have been distorted, misused, or repressed are often reflected in the dreams. The dream will always want to move us toward wholeness...all instincts functioning and engaged in our lives.

When Jung was immersed in his study of the symbolism of the fish in Christianity, alchemy and world mythology, the theme started leaping at him in everyday life. On April 1, 1949, he made some notes about an ancient inscription describing a man whose bottom half was a fish. At lunch that day, he was served fish. In the conversation, there was talk of the custom of making an "April fish" - a European term for "April fool" - of someone. In the afternoon, a former patient of Jung's, whom he had not seen for months, arrived at his house and displayed him some "impressive" pictures of fish. That evening, Jung was shown embroidery that featured fishy sea monsters. The next day, another former patient he had not seen in a decade recounted a dream in which a large fish swam towards her. Several months later, mulling over this sequence as an example of the phenomenon he dubbed synchronicity, Jung walked by the lake near his house, returning to the same spot several times. The last time he repeated this loop, he found a fish a foot long lying on top of the sea-wall. Jung had seen no one else on the lake shore that morning. While the fish might have been dropped by a bird, its appearance seemed to him quite magical, part of a "run of chance" in which more than "chance" seemed to be at play

A simplified life in nature exemplifies the ideal environment for inner growth; this fact has been alluded to in mystical literature, which expressed the need for humbleness, quietude and the beautiful surrounding of the country. You won’t find sacred literature extolling the need for 25,000 square foot castles, or the newest electronic gadget for that matter. The point was made there is a higher purpose to life, other than materialistic or narcissistic acquisitions, this involves serious inner work on our own ignorance. The advice to “Know Thyself” was the quintessence of Greek philosophy, also applies here.

Dr. Carl G. Jung was an historian! Who knew?! His five-decade long study of the mystery of alchemy seemed a sideshow to me for the longest time. Why resurrect an ancient practice, which had been discarded by intellectuals for centuries? What does making gold have to do with it?

Gradually, over many years of studying the master’s work, it became obvious to me that it would be necessary to enter the labyrinth of his oeuvre on alchemy, to understand what Dr. Jung was really saying in all of those books. Finally, I bought a copy, and like the Philosopher’s Stone to which it refers, it remained on my bookshelf for months, untouched by human hands—incorruptible.

Thank you for this insight into Jung's work and study on Alchemy. Jungian psychology without the study of Alchemy is without its core. I have come to this understanding as well. We must go backwards and understand the roots of alchemy to move forward.

The study of the cultural roots of Egyptian and Greek Hermeticism and Gnosticism is key to understanding Jung. The Renaissance alchemists and philosophers did so in order to put the pieces of the puzzle together to find the Philosopher's Stone. Jung pointed us both backward and forward to our selves and our relationship with Cosmos, Psyche and Matter. So, true.."he more we understand, the less we know".

Dear Eva, Many thanks! It's nice to see someone is reading what I write! That's something ... I hope to find more interactions with you. Best regards, Skip Conover PS Please follow http://archetypeinaction.com

We now spend an average of 90 percent of our time living and working in sealed-off, air-tight, toxic, manmade environments....

Plants make us feel good. In fact, other elements of the natural world do also. Why is that?

In a word, it's "biophilia." A term coined by social psychologist Erich Fromm in the 1960s, biophilia is our biologically-inherited need to commune with nature. Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson, in his book Biophilia defines it as "the connections that human beings subconsciously seek with the rest of life." In his biophilia hypothesis, Wilson has urged that these connections are imperative for healthy emotional development and wellbeing.⊃1;

When I first heard about biophilia... it really resonated with me. I had recently learned about Nature Deficit Disorder (NDD)⊃2; an unofficial behavioral disorder that stems from the "disconnect" our children have with the natural world. Biophilia certainly explained the challenge of NDD and why it has a profound impact on our future.

As a species, humans evolved over millions of years amid natural surroundings. Our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual... (Click title for more)

We all have complexes. At the heart of every complex there is a trauma, and also the archetype of that situation, providing the instinctual response and symbols.

When something triggers a complex, we are automatically identified with its underlying archetype. They are a trio—trauma, complex, and archetype—and the particular trio leading to the Outsider is perhaps the most dangerous. Humans very often simply despair and give up when they feel permanently left out in the cold... (Click title for more)

Psychotherapist and historian Philip Cushman views person and culture abiding within one another in gradual, constant flux. In this "strange, unorthodox" and remarkable book, he relates the evolution of psychotherapy from Freud to the present in the context of social change from Victorian to post-modern culture. By the same token he portrays psychotherapy as simultaneously determined by, and influential in, the cultural milieu. This will annoy therapists who see themselves as occupying a scientific perch nicely insulated from social pressure, governed by universal, immutable truths about human nature. It will also challenge historians who sniff at psychological theory without knowing how deeply it has affected their terrain.

Cushman writes about the "empty self," the self as commodity created and fulfilled by what he sees as a social milieu emphasizing individualism, consumption, political ignorance, advertising and marketing.

Psychotherapy--and its relationship to the United States--is anything but simple; it is one of the most complex, colorful, and strange artifacts of the modern era. It is a social institution with many theoretical frameworks, ideologies, and guilds. It features some of the most varied and creative ideas of the last 150 years. Its practitioners have developed some of the most unusual... (Click title for more)

Canadian Robert Lepage’s Far Side of the Moon (Le face cachée de la lune) is a marvelous alchemical stirring of science, history, myth, and philosophy. It’s refreshing in that, rather than portray integration as occurring between a man and woman, Lepage’s polarized human psyche is characterized by two brothers played by Lepage.

As opposed to frequent philosophizing from Philippe, we know nothing of André’s internal life. He is indeed the dark side of the moon, Philippe’s shadow. Popular film often portrays the integration drama from the standpoint of the worldly one. Materially successful protagonist discovers the depths of soul and feeling hidden beneath a restless seeking after socioeceonomic power; it’s the Scrooge portrait. Lepage gives us the flip of this cinematic norm; artist and visionary with Scrooge-like shadow-brother longs to experience his creative gifts reflected....

“In classical times, when such things were properly understood, Eros was considered a god whose divinity transcended our human limits, and who therefore could be neither comprehended nor represented in any way.

I might, as many before me have attempted to do, venture an approach to this daimon, whose range of activity extends from the endless spaces of the heavens to the dark abysses of hell; but I falter before the task of finding the language which might adequately express the incalculable paradoxes of love.

Eros is a kosmogonos, a creator and father-mother of all higher consciousness. I sometimes feel that Paul’s words—“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love”—might be the first condition of all cognition and the quintessence of divinity itself. Whatever the learned interpretation of the sentence “God is love,” the words affirm the ... (Click title to read more)

"In any Dark time, there is a tendency to veer toward fainting over how much is wrong or un-mended in the World. Do not focus on that. There is a tendency, too, to fall into being weakened by dwelling on what is Outside your Reach, by what cannot yet be. Do not focus there. That is spending the wind without raising the sails....

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire World all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely. It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom, will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good.....

What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts, adding, adding to, adding more, continuing. We know that it does not take everyone on Earth to bring justice and peace, but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second, or hundredth gale. One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul.

Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these – to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity ....there can be no despair when you remember why you came to Earth, who you serve, and who sent you here.

The good words we say and the good deeds we do are not ours. They are the words and deeds of the One who brought us here. In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But that is not what great ships are built for."

Carl Jung contemplates the archetype of rebirth and resurrection. It is through metaphorical experiences of death and rebirth that we come to know what is essential within us. His five forms of rebirth are as follows... (Click title for the full article)

Carl Jung believed that active imagination is a channel for messages from the unconscious.

In December 1913, Jung first experienced what he was later to call active imagination. However, he did not talk about these experiences until twelve years later, when, in May and June 1925, he “spoke for the first time of his inner development” at two sessions of a series of weekly seminars he was giving in Zurich. The contents of these lectures were not published until 1989, but a partial account of these experiences was given in 1962 by Aniela Jaffé in Jung’s Memories, Dreams, Reflections, which she largely wrote. This account is the foundation myth, the charter, for active imagination.

In 1913, according to this account, Jung, profoundly distressed at his break with Freud, began to experiment with different ways to enter into his own imaginings. As James Hillman describes it, “When there was nothing else to hold to, Jung turned to the personified images of interior vision. He entered into an interior drama, took himself into an imaginative fiction and then, perhaps, began his healing — even if it has been called his breakdown.

In this imaginal world, Jung began to confront and question the figures who appeared to him; and, to Jung’s surprise, those imaginal persons replied to him in turn. “Near the steep slope of a rock,” Jung says, “I caught sight of two figures, an old man with a white beard and a beautiful young girl. I summoned up my courage and approached them as though they were real people, and listened attentively to what they told me... (Click title for more)

The purpose of this post isn’t going to be about what you think it’s going to be about.

You read the word imagination in the title, but actually I’m going to talk about the word in a different way.

And so this little exchange will be a good example of how the mind works when Mercury is retrograde. Or rather what we see about the nature of our habitual mind and the way it works. Which is usually predictable and reactive — thinking but not really understanding.

Mercury retrogrades can be a fortuitous time to foster understanding, because the mental process of the mind is heightened, more engaged and possibly — with a little effort — more present. In fact, compared to its normal rhythm, the mind is liable to feel charged with Mercurial quicksilver.

The blog and postings will now be based from my website. Since some of the transit information is timely, and Scoop.It sometime delivers it up to 24 hours after posting, I want you to receive the information in the most timely manner.

Our Unique Image - James Hillman

"Each life is formed by its unique image, an image that is the essence of that life and calls it to a destiny. As the force of fate, this image acts as a personal daimon, an accompanying guide who remembers your calling." (James Hillman)

Our Unique Image - James Hillman

"Each life is formed by its unique image, an image that is the essence of that life and calls it to a destiny. As the force of fate, this image acts as a personal daimon, an accompanying guide who remembers your calling." (James Hillman)

"One way to the experience of the Self is by means of our psychopathology, since an archetypal strand of the Self is found within it. We can carry our own wounds with the realization that they both derive from the Self and are healed by the Self. Our struggle now is for conscious participation in this process rather than for vicarious sacrifice; each individual must make his or her own sacrifice as demanded by the Self." ~Lionel Corbett, The Religious Function of the Psyche (pp. 110-11) (click title for more depth psychology image quotes

The common ground of carl Jung and Rudolf Steiner offers keys to an evolution of consciousness through their common ancestor, Goethe...

Although contemporaries, Carl Jung and Rudolf Steiner never met. And although they did not have much good to say about the other, they shared a common philosophical ancestor, Wolfgang von Goethe. (Rumor has it that Jung may have shared more than a philosophical lineage as his grandfather may have been an illegitimate offspring of Goethe’s!) Both men studied Goethe’s book length poem Faust as teenagers, Jung at the suggestion of his mother, and Steiner encouraged by a teacher who was editing Faust at the time.

Goethe’s work presents an alternative approach to the natural world and the psyche, from the mechanistic way that has developed since Descartes. It reflects an approach that perceives the whole as a living substance, whether that be the human psyche or the flower growing along the roadside. Goethe developed techniques to communicate with the living substance of a plant... Click title for more

So it is the same idea as in alchemy—that the earth had been transformed into a transparent, waterlike, yet hard and imperishable, incorruptible structure.

Therefore, the philosopher’s stone is the expression of the highest perfection of the earthly body, and, therefore, you also find the idea that the lapis philosophorum is man himself, that is, his corpus glorificatum, his body at the Resurrection.

This immortal body is the subtle body that had left the physical body and is beyond corruption. The diamond, the hardest mineral, is synonymous with the lapis philosophorum. This is ancient metaphysics, old speculation in symbolic form.

The myth of Psyche (the word psyche means “soul” in Greek), Cupid, her invisible lover (Eros in Greek), and Cupid’s mother, the goddess of beauty and love, Venus (Aphrodite in Greek), illustrates how deeply Beauty, Soul, and Love are interrelated.

This relationship can show up in a modern context of the spa experience. The many spa treatments readily available might be presumed to be merely pampering and possibly even decadent. However, if approached in the right frame of mind, they have the potential to touch us deeply and nurture the soul.

STORY OVERVIEW

The story of “The Invisible Lover” is a chapter from the greater work of The Metamorphoses (also known as... (Click title for more)...

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